When a faction is divided and declares itself a new faction, that marks the separation from the old and thus it’s functionally a different political entity.
The Alliance has never divided like that. The Alliance of Lordaeron and the Grand Alliance are one, continuous political entity. The members have changed over the years, but it never disbanded or split into a new Alliance.
To draw a parallel using real life politics from my own country:
The Central Party of Finland was founded in 1906, and by the time it was called the Agrarian League. It was a pretty socialist party representing the views of the farmers, hence the agrarian name. They changed their name to the Central Party in 1965, but their agenda has (largely) remained the same to this day.
It never became a new party, it was simply renamed.
Meanwhile a few years ago the right wing PerSu party split into two, the new smaller party being more far right with thinly veiled racism. PerSu and the Blue Reform parties are two different parties due to the division despite their shared origins.
Will Sylvanas just rebrand the Horde as the “New Forsaken” and give the formal entity of “the Horde” to Saurfang, thereby being absolved of everything “the Horde” did while Saurfang has to carry the responsibility as new Warchief of “the Horde”?
I also forgot to answer this, but Alexstrasza forgave it because Garrosh objectively had nothing to do with it and the weird collective punishment (which is a war crime in real life ayY) stance the Alliance took was full of
Ohhh like that, fair enough. Yea I suppose the Grand Alliance is a continuation of the Alliance Resistance which is a groupd of survivors from the Alliance of Lordaeron then?
And honestly, being able to just proclaim yourself a new party sounds like a real easy excuse to make any faction get out of any blame for what they have done D:
But like, your uncle’s dog knows a man who’s nephew is befriended with a guy who heard of a girl who’s married with a Blizzard employee, right? D: xD
Are they though? The “last” warchief of the Old Horde is also the “first” warchief of the New Horde, coincidence? I think not. And all the founding members of the “new” Horde where also members of the Old Horde.
The second warchief of the New Horde was also the first warchief of the True Horde and integral in the founding of the Iron Horde.
Honestly, warcrimes is a crime of a novel, for both the Alliance and Horde and never should’ve existed (then again, alot of the novels are ridiculous, only good warcraft novels are the RPGs,. chronicles and travellers).
Deep in the darkest corners of the Argent Dawn forums, threads where few regular posters dared to tread for fear that their Trust Level would be diminished, stood Telaryn.
He was a fine and upstanding gentleman, widely respected in most threads as a learned scholar of Warcraft lore. In this thread he looked totally out of place. But there was good reason for his presence here.
Just then entered another figure, unassuming and without any identifiable traits. An alt poster. They approached Telaryn swiftly to pass him, making only the faintest of hand gestures that would have been missed by most.
The package had been delivered.
Telaryn stole away from that thread as quickly as he had arrived there, his dark work done in the shadows where no one might suspect a thing. There in the seclusion of the home page he hungrily tore open the envelope that had been passed on to him, sealed with blue wax imprinted with the Blizzard Entertainment logo.
Inside were the scrawlings of mad men and women on headed paper, and across them the “CONFIDENTIAL” stamp. The internal memos of the story department. These were the secrets he coveted most of all.
A smug grin crossed his face, with this he could change the face of the forums forever and truly assert himself as Loremaster supreme. The power to know what was coming before anyone else, a cipher with which to understand the coming insanity.
Attached with a paperclip to this internal document was a small scrap of paper, no doubt ripped away from some notepad or another. On it written one thing and one thing only.
Alexstrasza forgave it because Garrosh objectively had nothing to do with it
She’d forgive anyone, and in the novel it’s seeing Thrall and his family that pushes her over the edge of saying that outright.
From War Crimes page 217:
The tauren inclined his head, then turned to regard Alexstrasza. “I have a final question. If one of the selfsame orcs who so tormented you, who killed your children while they were still in the shell, were to come today and ask your forgiveness… what would you do?”
The great Life-Binder’s smile was small at first, but it grew. Alexstrasza looked over to where Go’el and his family were seated, and held his gaze. When she spoke at last, a light seemed to shine from her, so bright was her spirit.
“I would forgive him, of course.” She said it to Baine as if he were a child, as if it were a simple, obvious answer.
I quoted from the book earlier regarding this, but the prosecutor’s (Tyrande) argument is that he did have something to do with it, because he let it continue under his reign. This is all adressed in the novel. :v
War Crimes page 212:
Tyrande said, “Fa’shua, Garrosh Hellscream received important and influential from one clan in particular - the Dragonmaw clan. I wish to show you the sort of people with whom Garrosh allied himself in recent times.”
“Fa’shua”, Baine interjected, “we all have - most of us have, anyway - kept poor company from time to time. What the Dragonmaw clan did in the past is irrelevant.”
“Chu’shao Bloodhoof’s point is accurate,” said Taran Zhu.
“Yes, but it is not the whole story,” Tyrande replied. “The Dragonmaw enslaved and continue to enslave and torment dragons. They did so under Garrosh’s reign, and I think this witness highly appropriate.”
Taran Zhu nodded, satisfied. “I agree with the Accuser. You may continue your examination.”
I guess they could’ve had some black dragon be the one giving this testimony (since the later Dragonmaw drakes are mostly black drakes), but then that dragon wouldn’t have been able to recall all the WC2 story.
The whole exchange is kind of weird if you dig into the legalese of it all (so because the leader of one dragonflight forgave it, that means the crimes… aren’t? etc.) - but best not to read too deeply into the legal subtext in a fantasy game.
And all the founding members of the “new” Horde where also members of the Old Horde.
